Alex felt tears start to sting her eyes as she explained the night’s events, from the answering machine message, the strange behaviour of Lauren at Ryan’s, the fight with Matt and finally the men in the van on the side of the road.
Michelle grimaced. “So he just drove off and left you here? No offence, but your boyfriend sounds like a complete tool. What the hell do you see in him?”
“Lately, I have no idea. I fell in love with the fact he was so unco-ordinated, so scraggy and adorable, but now… Anyway, to hell with him,” Alex said, wiping the fresh tears away. “So what is it with you and Dante? Are you his girlfriend?”
Michelle let out aloud “Ha!” as she turned the car into the main street. “No, Dante doesn’t have a girlfriend. I’m his personal assistant, if you have to put a name to it.”
“Does being his personal assistant require you to know how to shoot?”
Michelle looked out at the street with slightly raised eyebrows. “You’d be surprised.”
“Ok, seriously, can I ask you something?”
“Now would seem like a good time. Go ahead.”
“What the hell is with Dante? He is like no one I have ever seen. Handsome, charming, an old soul, yet he can go all freaky like he did when he looked at Ryan that night at T.”
“To be fair, given what you have seen of Ryan, wouldn’t you say Dante was correct in his freakiness?”
“Yeah, true, but that’s not what I mean. I actually felt scared when I looked at his eyes. He looked so angry. And another thing: he is like the sweetest guy on earth; he carried me into up the stairs and into my bedroom the other night, yet he makes you go to Ryan’s place tonight instead of going himself. What if it did get bad? I don’t think I like the fact he would’ve expected you to just follow his orders, when he was the one with the suspicion of Ryan in the first place. Why all the secrecy? It makes me think it’s all an act.”
Michelle nodded. “I know what you’re saying and that is admittedly more difficult to answer, but I will give it my best shot. Dante isn’t playing a game, but he can’t get personally involved, because it has nothing to do with him. It’s like it’s not his…shall we say, jurisdiction.”
“What do you mean?”
“Look. Dante has the strongest sense of right and wrong I have ever known, in anyone. Although he mostly keeps to himself with regards to the world, if he believes someone he cares about is being hard done by, he feels as if he has to act. But he only truly cares for very few people. It just so happens that you’re one of them. As for worry about you tonight, well, it’s hard to explain. Dante and I felt he would’ve been more of a hindrance if he showed up. Trust me though, he is never far away.”
Alex had no idea what that was supposed to mean, but understood from Michelle’s tone that was all she was going to get.
“I’m bored talking about me and him. I know about that. Tell me more about you,” Michelle said. “Let it take your mind off tonight.”
Alex leaned her head back in the seat and closed her eyes a moment. It felt nice to follow Michelle’s advice and she felt herself relax, letting her mind wander back to her childhood. “Well, there’s nothing much to tell. I guess the first thing is I was raised by my aunt since I was about two.”
“So, your parents?”
“My dad died when I was really young. Cancer. My mum, well…” Alex made a face.
“Is something wrong?”
“No, it’s just… I love her, but she’s not exactly my favourite person in the world. I haven’t spoken about her in a long time.”
“Ah. No worries. You don’t have to if you don’t feel like it.”
“No, it’s ok. The only people who know the whole story were Lauren and Matt, and I could tell they were sick of hearing it, so I just stopped talking about it. But sometimes it helps to get it off my chest. My mum was clinically depressed and went insane after my father died. I was given to my aunt while mum went to a home. I always figured it was my dad’s dying that set her off. But the weird thing was, whenever my aunt took me to go to visit Mum, she would ignore me. All she would say is ‘I don’t know you’ or ‘I don’t have a daughter.’”
“Wow, that’s got to be rough. But you can’t blame her for that if she was sick, right?”
“Well… You see, the doctors told us her memory was fine. They had no idea why she was acting like she couldn’t remember me when she could certainly remember everything and everybody else. It got to the stage where anytime I visited, she would cry and beg me to go away. There is something about me that she can’t stomach. I haven’t set foot in that place for almost twenty years.”
The rest of the trip was silent as Michelle drove her home. When she pulled up outside Alex’s apartment, Alex spotted Matt’s car.
“What the— What’s he doing here?” Alex asked.
Then Matt emerged from the building with a box. He put it in the boot of his car and slammed the lid closed.
“He must be clearing out his stuff,” mumbled Alex.
“He hasn’t seen you. Are you going to stop him?” Michelle asked.
Alex sat staring at Matt, conflicting emotions running through her. On the verge of tears, her throat clenched and she couldn’t answer. She crossed her arms and forced herself
